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If You Want To Do The Work, Learn How To Facilitate

Boats and water

My dad loves to sail. In fact, he loved it so much when I was a kid that he bought a sailboat together with a friend. It was a beautiful yawl, and I remember spending summer vacations sailing on the boat with my family.

But taking care of the boat was a lot of work, and it took a lot of money to maintain it. When storms came through, he worried about the boat, and had to go down to check on it frequently. It was simply too much.

So Dad figured out a better way. He realized that he was both a good sailor and a good cook. So he sold he share in the boat, and offered to be cook and crew on other people’s boats. Suddenly, the whole world of boats was his, for he was welcome crew on any of them.

The Same Principle Holds True When Doing The Work

If you learn the skill of facilitating, you can do The Work with anyone. You no longer need to hire a facilitator. You can trade sessions with a friend.

This is very helpful when you want to do The Work on a regular basis.

But learning to facilitate helps in other ways as well. In fact it’s so helpful that I sometimes ask clients to facilitate me during a session, when they’re paying me to do The Work! Why would I do that?

When You Facilitate You Become A More Conscious Client

When you’ve led people through the questions of The Work, you become familiar with what those questions mean. You start to understand them more deeply.

This means that when you’re in the role of the client yourself, you understand the intention of the questions more clearly. And you can answer them more easily.

For Example, Question 4

Question 4, “Who would you be without that thought?” can be a tough question to answer sometimes. But when you facilitate other people, you watch them run up against this question, and you have to really think about it yourself.

I’ve found myself rephrasing it sometimes, when a client gets stuck with it. And as I experiment, and grapple with the question, I see inroads into it. And I see how helpful it is to hold the client in the specifics of their situation when they answer this question.

This experience comes back to serve me when I’m answering question 4 later on when I’m a client.

And There Are Other Advantages To Learning Facilitation

You get to see other people do their work. And you soon see that they have the same kinds of problems that you have. It really helps to know that you’re not alone.

Also, when others unravel their own beliefs, it gives you courage to look more deeply into yours. In fact, the same logic that broke the spell on a client’s belief system, may well break the spell on yours.

And finally, when you facilitate others, you get practice holding them to the questions. This is essential training for the times when you want to facilitate yourself in written form.

When you’re doing The Work on your own on paper, the mind will try to trick you out of answering the questions. Just like the minds of your clients will try to avert answering the questions. By practicing facilitating other people, you naturally become better at holding yourself in inquiry too.

Here’s Everything You Need To Become A Facilitator

Yep, just one simple card:

4 Questions Card

Download the “4 Questions Card,” formerly known as the “Yellow Card,” from Byron Katie’s website using the link above. Print out a copy on card stock, printing on both sides of the paper. And cut into cards.

Find a friend who is open to doing The Work. And follow the directions on both sides of the card. It’s that simple. You can even do The Work with kids.

Suddenly, there is no shortage of people to do The Work with. When you know how to facilitate, it’s easy to find other people to work with.

It’s just what my dad found. There is never any shortage of sailboats if you’re an able crew member that also knows how to cook.

So Give It A Try This Week

Pick a friend and make a date. And if you run into any issues, send me an email.

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